Little House in the Big City
by Lady Anne
Summary: TV based, takes place after finale. A Jeb & Jenny love story. Chapter 2 up. Please R & R.
1. Chapter 1

The click of the young woman's shoes on the wood planks of the store fronts echoed as she pushed her way through the crowds of people in her way as she headed to the post office. When she reached the window, she smiled at the elderly lady and laid her card on the counter.

"Good afternoon, Mrs. Smith," the young lady said.

"Oh, Miss Wilder! Good afternoon. Lovely weather today, isn't it?"

"Yes ma'am," Jenny replied with a grin, then waited expectantly.

"How can I help you, dear?"

Jenny picked up the card and showed it to the gray-haired woman, "You have something for me today, Mrs. Smith."

"Oh, land sakes alive!" she exclaimed as she rose from her chair and turned her back to Jenny. She fumbled around, grumbling about the trials of getting older, and finally turned back to Jenny, letter in hand. She placed it on the counter and pushed it under the bottom of the window, and Jenny reached out and pulled it to her. Instantly she recognized the handwriting on the envelope and she glanced up to Mrs. Smith with a grin. She had been hoping the letter would be from him.

"Thank you, Mrs. Smith!" she said, and turned and walked a few paces away, while tearing open the envelope. Excitedly, she pulled out the letter and unfolded it and began reading.

"_My Dearest Jenny,_

_Thank you for your last letter, my dear, as it was exactly the push I needed to get through final examinations. I'm proud to inform you that I passed with flying colors, and my formal education is finally over. I am coming home to you, at last. It hardly seems possible that it has only been a year since my last visit home, as it feels as though it has been three or four times that long ago. _

_Upon my return, there are things we need to discuss. For one, I've been offered several jobs by many different prominent newspaper agencies. New York, Chicago, and St. Louis are just three examples. I've given no one an answer for sure, as I feel this is a decision you and I should be making together._

_Also upon my return, I intend to ask your Uncle Almanzo. After these long years of being mostly apart from you, I don't know if I can wait another day. I love you, Jenny, and I hope that you will be waiting on the train platform when I return home on June 25__th_

_Yours,_

_Jeb"_

Jenny pulled the letter to her breast and sighed happily. He was coming home at last! She folded the letter and stuffed it back into the envelope, then picked up her long skirt in one hand, and ran back through the throngs of people and headed home.

Though she was now twenty-one and old enough to live on her own, Jenny still lived with her Uncle Almanzo, Aunt Laura, and her cousin Rose. City life had been hard for all of the Wilders to get used to after leaving the peace and quiet of Walnut Grove. The conditions on which they left the country town certainly had not helped any of them. Eight years ago, the town had been destroyed and the Wilders had traveled for months afterward with the Carter family and Mr. Edwards before finally settling in Mansfield. The got settled in town and lived over a seamstress shop that Laura opened, until they had had enough money to purchase land to start farming again. Laura and Jenny still worked at the seamstress shop, though now it was Jenny who put in the most hours there. The Carters had only gone as far as the edge of the city, where John Carter set up a blacksmith shop and eventually built a home for his family. Mr. Edwards said good-bye to his "Half-Pint" and the rest of the family, and proclaimed that he was headed out west to find his fortune in gold.

Jenny and Jeb had always been close, since they first met eleven years ago in Walnut Grove, but after all they had gone through with the destruction of Walnut Grove and the months of looking for a new place to settle, the two became closer than ever, and after settling into city life, they had became all but inseparable, until Jeb had gone off to college. They had talked about marriage before he left, but he had told her there was no way he could ask for her hand until he was ready to provide for her. Now it seemed that time and come, and Jenny couldn't stop grinning.

"Well, don't you look like the cat who ate the canary," Laura commented when Jenny entered the shop.

Jenny took off her hat and pulled her long brown hair back behind her shoulders. She set the hat on the counter and turned and looked back at her aunt, who was sitting in one of the rockers hemming a skirt.

"Jeb is coming home," Jenny said excitedly.

Laura set her sewing down and grinned at her niece. "Oh, Jenny," she said. "You must be so excited."

"Oh, I am!" she said as she sat in the rocker next to her aunt. "He'll be home on the 25th- only three days away!"

The bell on the door sounded, signaling that someone had opened it, and both women looked up to see Rose, a furious look on her face.

"Rose!" Laura cried as Rose slammed the door shut.

"I've had it with that boy, Mama!" she hollered with her fists clenched at her sides.

"Rose, dear, please stop shouting, and just tell me what happened," Laura said in a calming tone.

Rose huffed, and sat in the last empty chair beside her mother and proceeded to tell the women what "that boy" had done to her at school today. As Laura listened intently, Jenny looked again at her precious letter, and remembered when _that_ boy had done his fair share of teasing her. She smiled fondly as she thought of the first time she met Jeb Carter back in Walnut Grove.

TBC


	2. Chapter 2

_Jeb Carter was up to bat when he caught movement from the corner of his eyes. He turned his head to see a woman and young girl who looked close to his age walking towards the school. _

_"Strike two!" Willie called._

_Jeb turned his head back to the pitcher, and held the bat out to show where he wanted the pitch, before looking again at the woman and the girl. They were closer to the school now, and Jeb could see that's where they were headed. Clearly, the girl would be a new student. He now recognized the woman as the lady who had been at his new home the day Mr. Ingalls moved the last of his family's things. _

_"Come on, Jeb!"_

_Jeb turned back to Willie and gripped the bat harder. The pitch came, and he hit the ball and ran to first, then cheered on his younger brother, Jason._

_By the time Jeb scored, Mrs. Plum was ringing the bell for school to begin. He ran over to pick up his books and lunch pail, and followed everyone inside. Mrs. Plum closed the doors behind them and pushed past the students to the front of the school._

_"Class, we have a new student today," the teacher told them. "Jenny Wilder."_

_Jeb looked in awe at the new girl who now had a name. He felt like he was looking at an angel. Jenny was dressed in a red dress with little pink flowers. She had brown hair that was pulled back into two braids, and her expression told him that she was quite anxious about starting school._

_Mrs. Plum pointed Jenny to a seat and Jeb watched her as she walked from the front of the school to the desk just on the other side of the aisle from him. She looked at him shyly, and he nearly gasped as they made eye contact. Her beautiful blue eyes took his breath away. He was sure now that she had been brought straight from Heaven. He grinned at her and she looked down at the desk, her cheeks flushed in embarrassment. He couldn't take his eyes off her, and she looked up at him again, this time with a small grin of her own._

_"Jeb?" he vaguely heard Mrs. Plum's voice. "Jeb Carter!"_

"Mr. Carter?"

Jeb looked away from the window, startled by both the voice trying to get his attention, and the hand shaking his arm. He looked up at the attendant that had been trying to get his attention.

"Mr. Carter, may I offer you some tea or coffee?"

"Oh, no. No, thank you." He looked back out the window, and saw the terrain still rushing by. "How far are we?"

"We'll be in Mansfield in about an hour, sir," the man responded and then left Jeb alone again.

Jeb looked out once more as a grin settled on his face. He would be home soon. He sighed in contentment at the thought and then nearly laughed at himself. He never thought he'd think of Mansfield as "home". Though his family had only lived in Walnut Grove for a short time, it was where he had met and fallen in love with Jenny and for a long time after they left Minnesota, he had felt homesick. Now after being away at the university, he realized that "home" was where his Jenny was. He stopped seeing the scenery as the train passed it, and thought back to the day they left Walnut Grove.

_It was eerily quiet now. The last of the town buildings had been destroyed. Jeb heard someone near him sniffle, and he looked to his right to see Jenny dab her nose with a handkerchief. He knew she was trying to be strong, but he also realized how hard this was on her. He quietly moved to stand beside her, and put an arm around her shoulders. She leaned into him, thankful for his comfort and his strength, and he surprised them both when he gently kissed the top of her head. _

_The day before, she had asked him to go with her to visit her father's grave for what would be the last time. He had gone with her that morning before all the destruction began, and they had stood in similar pose, as he loaned her his quiet strength with his arm around her shoulders as she cried. He had wanted nothing more than to be able to stop those tears and to see her smile again, but he understood her misery. Now as he stood beside her, he felt the finality and tried desperately to push back the lump in his throat. Their families would be loading up in the wagons and headed out. None of them knew for sure where they were headed, or if they would see each other again._

_The thought of never seeing Jenny again made him unconsciously grip her shoulder harder. She pulled away slightly and looked at him. He looked down at her, his teeth gritted and the lump in his throat growing by the second. His eyebrows furrowed and he looked desperately into her eyes, silently begging her not to say anything, especially good-bye. She reached up to her shoulder and gripped his hand tightly, then took a shaky breath and tried to smile at him even as a single tear flowed down her cheek. He let go of her shoulder and reached up to her face and gently wiped the tear away._

"_Well," a voice said from nearby. Jeb looked up to see Mr. Edwards watching Reverend Alden walk down the road that used to be Walnut Grove as he headed for the church, "I reckon we should join the reverend over at the church."_

_Jenny took a hold of Jeb's hand, and they followed the adults, both watching the ground as they walked towards the church for the last time. Neither wanted to look at the destruction of their precious town._


End file.
